with the devil,--

"He who does not trust in God can never be trusted by man!"

The great soldier of fortune was near his end. The stars were powerless
to save him. It was not enough to deprive him of his command, his
enemies did not deem it safe to let him live. One army gone, his wealth
and his fame might soon bring him another, made up of those mercenary
soldiers of all nations, and of all or no creeds, who would follow Satan
if he promised them plunder. His death had been resolved upon, and the
agent chosen for its execution was Colonel Butler, one of the officers
who had accompanied him to Eger.

It was late in February, 1634. On the night fixed for the murder,
Wallenstein's faithful friends, Illo, Terzka, Kinsky, and Captain
Neumann were at a banquet in the castle of Eger. The agents of death
were Colonel Butler, an Irish officer named Lesley, and a Scotchman
named Gordon, while the soldiers employed were a number of dragoons,
chiefly Irish.

In the midst of the dinner the doors of the banqueting hall were burst
open, and the assassins rushed upon their victims, killing them as they
sat, with the exception of Terzka, who killed two of his assailants
before he was despatched.

From this scene of murder the assassins rushed to the quarters of
Wallenstein. It was midnight and he had gone to bed. He sprang up as his
door was burst open, and Captain Devereux, one of the party, rushed with
drawn sword into the room.

"Are you the villain who would sell the army to the enemy and tear the
crown from the emperor's head?" he shouted.

Wallenstein's only answer was to open his arms and receive the blow
aimed at his breast. He died without a word. Thus, with a brief interval
between, had fallen military genius and burning ambition in two
forms,--that of the heroic Swede and that of the ruthless Bohemian.

_THE SIEGE OF VIENNA._

Once more the Grand Turk was afoot. Straight on Vienna he had marched,
with an army of more than two hundred thousand men. At length he had
reached the goal for which he had so often aimed, the Austrian capital,
while all western Europe was threatened by his arms. The grand vizier,
Kara Mustapha, headed the army, which had marched straight through
Hungary without wasting time in petty sieges, and hastened towards the
imperial city with scarce a barrier in its path.

Consternation filled the Viennese as the vast army of the Turks rolled
steadily nearer and nearer, pillaging the cou